According to the statistics of the International Diabetes Federation (IDF), one of the most prevalent metabolic disorders is diabetes. Because of this chronic disease, the body cannot produce enough insulin or absorb it efficiently. Nowadays, in average, one out of six people is diabetic. Recent studies show that one, by controlling blood glucose level, injecting timely proportionate insulin, exercising regularly and having a healthy dietary program, can prevent diabetes repercussions. So measuring blood glucose level before and after food and before going to sleep, on a daily basis, is a key factor for diabetics to live healthy without diabetes side effects.
Therefore due to increasing number of diabetics and increasing demand in the market for medical instruments to control the disease, there was a need to overcome the shortcomings of older glucose measuring models.
Today most of the glucometers in the market comprise of three separate components:
Screen, lancet, and strip, packed together in a small bag. Because of different separate components, these kinds of glucometers are not efficient in all situations especially in outdoor situations.
It is noteworthy that most of the type 1 diabetics (dependent on insulin) are children or youth who are very active and usually stay outdoor in schools or universities during the day. For example when a diabetic is playing or driving car or is walking on the street in rush hour, cannot easily open the bag and use several components to measure his/her blood glucose.
Because of these shortcomings, the diabetics who are dependent on insulin cannot control the fluctuations of their blood glucose level regularly. Therefore “accessibility” and “user friendly” are the most important features of such a device to provide convenience for diabetics to control their blood glucose every time in every situation or in every location to mitigate any side effect of the disease in the future.
Diabetics dependent on Insulin (type 1) contrary to independent diabetics (type 2) normally face with blood glucose level fluctuations during the day. So multiple blood testing is necessary for them to control these fluctuations as soon as possible. Therefore “easy to use” feature of device and “having access” to it in every situation is very vital for the users.
A diagnostic apparatus of this type is known from U.S. 2013/0274568 A1, an arrangement comprises housing multiple needles. Each needle has an inner passageway or lumen, an analyst quantification member that comprise an assay pad is provided in communication with the lumen of the needle, can receive a sample of blood produced by the piercing of the user's skin with the needle. Each needle pierces the user's skin by the torsional spring elements that are mounted to triggering member. The plurality of components of this device such as plurality of needles and the actuators indicates the complexity of the system, which causes the manufacturing and assembling of device becomes more sophisticated and expensive. Also changing the used needles and assay pads couldn't be user friendly.
U.S 2014/0114160A1 shows a blood testing apparatus which includes a laser source configured to produce a wound from which blood flows for measuring its glucose level. This apparatus has also a plenty of components which make it complex and big. These features altogether could lessen the attractiveness of the device and increase its manufacturing cost.